Rig Rollover Ties Up Traffic Near I-81 Off-ramp

A tractor trailer crashed on the North Scranton Expressway. The inbound lanes coming from Dickson City are closed. It appears truck was turning from the notch onto the Expressway. Police say the truck is hauling onions. @wneppic.twitter.com/AEDdyhcFR6

SCRANTON, Pa. -- A rig rollover on an interstate off-ramp has traffic tied up in part of Lackawanna County.

It happened around 11:30 a.m. Friday near the Scranton Expressway exit (191) from Interstate 81 in Scranton.

A tractor-trailer from Georgia toppled while making a turn from Route 6 onto the North Scranton Expressway, taking up two lanes of traffic and sending its load of onions onto the highway near the Scranton/Dickson City line.

The driver wasn't hurt, but the crash caused headaches for many heading in to and out of the busy shopping district in Dickson City.

Melissa Silvestri thought her Friday afternoon errands would be a breeze.

"I was like, 'Seriously? Aren't you people supposed to be somewhere?'"

Shoppers near the Viewmont Mall can't see what's causing all the traffic but if your window is down and the wind is blowing in the right direction, you can certainly smell onions.

A little traffic is usually a good thing for Joe Kotowski's business "Cangiano's" but not today.

"You can smell the onions out here I thought it was just from us cutting onions in the back, but no," Kotowski said. "We had the road open up over here last month, PennDOT fixed that, yeah, there's always something going on on this road."

This time, it's onions.

As crews cleaned up the mess and worked to get the onion truck back on its tires, the traffic persisted. but, Melissa wasn't going to cry over it.

"Nah, not really, unless he has peppers and I don't have to stop at ShopRite!"

donny hud43987

DRIVE FASTER AROUND CORNERS IDIOT! Is he even legal? Probably not. I should ask are THEY even legal. I always see about five or six of those dirty sanchezs packed into one truck. You know, kinda like how they live. ISN’T THAT RIGHT HAZLETON?!